MS and Relationships: Tend the Garden Early

Last November, I started a webcast with MS Ireland that we’re calling The Unspeakable Bits, as we discuss topics that seem to be underrepresented in the multiple sclerosis (MS) space.

Most recently, we talked about MS and relationships.

I always have interesting and informed guests on the program, and my guests on this latest installment were a relationship counselor and a family law solicitor (attorney).

We talked about the importance of safety within a relationship, strategies to catch the small stuff before it gets out of hand, and legal remedies if things are broken beyond repair.

It’s funny how both of my guests talked about the importance of tending that garden early. Be it a prenuptial agreement or a bit of therapy (individual or couples) as a relationship begins, the road in front of us is always easier if we start paving it properly from the beginning.

We also talked in this episode about such issues as coercive control, neglect, abuse, and beyond. It wasn’t an easy conversation to have, let alone one to lead. But it was important for that difficulty, and it surely kept with our intent to speak the unspeakable.

There’s More to Come After the Break

Before we take a short summer break, I have guests scheduled to talk about the importance of keeping, maintaining, and mending connections we may have lost, as well as a full program on the topic of medical marijuana (and synthesized cannabinoids).

If that one doesn’t turn some heads, well, then, we’re just not doing our job well.

During the break, we’ll be recording a series of shorter podcasts that will be released in celebration of the 10th anniversary of the MS & Me blog, which I helped start back in 2013.

On the topic of connections and of MS & Me, my friend Declan wrote a piece on reconnecting that I found particularly pointed and powerful. Have a read and see for yourself. Declan is one of those guys who quietly and efficiently lives an amazing life that is an inspiration to me and to many others I know.

If all goes well, after we finish out this year of webcasts and podcasts, we’ll keep it going for a while longer. Lord knows there are enough unspeakable topics around living with MS to keep us in ideas for far longer than I’m comfortable thinking about.

Anyone Is Welcome to Join and Watch

If ever you want to join us for one of the Unspeakable Bits episodes live, we typically air at 8 p.m. Irish time (3 p.m. Eastern, 12 p.m. Pacific) on the third Thursday of the month.

May was a little different, as we decided that the theme of mending broken connections fitted in nicely on the eve of World MS Day (May 30), and so we broadcast that program on a Monday night.

Have a look at the relationships recording and, if you like, some of the others as well. There’s a good bit of important information in there whether you live in Ireland, the United States, or anywhere else in the world with multiple sclerosis.

Wishing you and your family the best of health.

Cheers,

Trevis